East Palace, West Palace

This haunting Chinese film is multi-texured. It is not just about being gay; it examines the very fabric of Chinese society in Beijing, which pretty much represents Chinese society in just about every city in China. It makes a strong political .statement without being political. It makes a strong social statement about those who are judgmental about gay men and their chosen lifestyle. And most of all; it humanizes a gay man. This man is far more in touch with his feelings than is his inquisitor. In my opinion, this film is better than Brokeback Mountain, but not quite as good as Philadephia and The Boys in the Band, the two best films ever made on gay lifestyles, and which humanize their protagonists, rather than sensationalize them. I can recommend this film as a unique cinematic experience.

'East Palace, West Palace' is a film that's immeasurably diminished, indeed misunderstood, if it's labeled a gay film.

Certainly, 'East Palace, West Palace' explores issues related to the gay experience. But that's the first, and indeed facile, layer. There are more.

In its context, it poses a society in transition. It explores the constructs of power, of state machinery, and how institutions and ideas past their prime can dehumanize both parties, victims as well as perpetrators.

The film has moments of lyrical and almost escapist beauty, leaving no room for the claustrophobia that the plot construct could easily have engendered. Visually and verbally, poetry in a police station makes for near-surreal surprises.

As it builds, the film undergoes sudden shifts, rising much above comment on the politics of desire. Instead, it begins to underline the politics of politics itself. The rights being debated in that one night in the police station have much more to do with the right to freedom, the right to self-expression, the right to identity, than to do with the right to cruise in parks.

In a lot of issue-based cinema, marginalization affects both parties equally. Both the person wielding the stick and the person encountering the stick get trapped in their predefined roles. Not so in 'East Palace, West Palace'. In the dialectic between the two protagonists, there can be no clear lines drawn between the powerful and the overpowered, the loving and the loved.

Intensely abstract, and, simultaneously, intensely personal. That's how 'East Palace, West Palace' succeeds for me.

As a gay man who'd expected to see yet another gay film, I should've checked my labels in at the door.

At a park where gays cruise for sex, police routinely harass them but can't actually charge them for a crime, even when confronted with "regulars". One is young writer A-Lan, who is picked up one night and spends until daybreak telling the sole policeman his life story. Interspersed with flashbacks, and also illustrations using Chinese opera (which I doubt is part of any actual opera). There is also a question as to how much of the story is true, and how much is his writer's imagination.

A-Lan keeps falling in love with handsome / taller / dominant men, and is happy to be sexually used and physically abused. It is not clear if any of his love objects actually self-identify as gay. However, A-Lan not only identifies as gay, but also has a gender fluidity with regards to those he loves, telling them to "treat me like a girl".

The Chinese opera depictions are interesting, but other things disappoint. It seems unlikely that a house with a suite of rooms is occupied by only one policeman, even overnight. Also, A-Lan's wife is mentioned but not explained.

This is a very unflattering depiction of one gay man's life in China, which could be generalized to all gay life in China of the period. Interestingly the film was banned in China for its gay subject matter, but China should have distributed it widely to warn against "going gay" by using this as a warning example.

In Beijing, gays have hidden sexual encounters in a park during the night and are severely repressed by the police. The writer A Lan (Si Han) is arrested by the policeman Xiao Shi (Jun Hu) and along the whole night, he is interrogated, disclosing his hard life-story since he was a child and his crush on Xiao Shi.

"Dong Gong Xi Gong" could be called confessions of an infatuated gay writer in Beijing. This film is bald and in accordance with the information on the cover of the VHS, "it is the first Chinese movie assumed gay, success in whole world… forbidden in China". The theatrical story is well acted by Si Han and Jun Hu. In accordance with the opinion of some IMDb reviewers, this film would be a metaphor of the repressive situation in China, but is it? I do not agree with this intellectualized interpretation, and in my opinion, it is a simple and well acted gay romance, better and better than the famous "Broke Back Mountain". My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "O Outro Lado da Cidade Proibida" ("The Other Side of the Forbidden City")

This film uses very simple means to tell its powerful story. I am very found of films which do exactly this, that composes a story with emotions in a condensed way that does not preach to you, that does not tell you in bad taste how to feel, but that still moves you, not only in the theater, but also later on.

I am sure that this film can evoke mixed emotions. Because as a viewer we may want one of the characters to be the victim, we may want him to be the one at the bottom which should fight, take the battle and overcome his oppressor. But that is not how the story is told. For those of you who know Genet and have read Genet's stories, you will know the ambiguity that can be given to the oppressor/victim relation. And how full of meaning and emotions a single object or moment can be.

So if you have read Genet and liked it, you will like this film. But be warned, if you are expecting a story which delivers a story about poor gay men in less fortunate countries, you will be challenged, not to think the other way around, however, rather to view the world in more than one dimension.